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Devotions For Dating Couples: Building A Foundation For Spiritual Intimacy

Devotions For Dating Couples: Building A Foundation For Spiritual Intimacy

List Price: $13.99
Your Price: $10.49
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good Ice Breaker
Review: Being a relationship where both of us aren't neccessarily on the same level in our relationship with God, I thought this book was really good. It helped us meet one another on a common ground. Helping us to discuss the basics of our Christian walk was definately good, it helped us to see where the other one was, so that we could accurately begin to pray for one another in regard to our relationships with God. It also spawned conversations about how we should relate to one another. All in all this was a good starter book for those couples who are introducing spiritual intimacy into their relationship with one another. God bless you and keep you!!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good starter book
Review: I like this book and recommend it as a starting place. My boyfreind and I are both strong adult christians with a view towards marriag and family. We attend church and consider God a foundation to us. However we were both a little shy about starting out to pray together, or read the bible together and so on. This book is a nice start. It is not overly heavy; each reading is short. It is not deep into theology nor does it preach. It is a nice easy starting point for us. Also I come from a more full-faith background while he is more consertive; this book has walked a nice middle ground.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: A nice general book
Review: I like this book and recommend it as a starting place. My boyfreind and I are both strong adult christians with a view towards marriag and family. We attend church and consider God a foundation to us. However we were both a little shy about starting out to pray together, or read the bible together and so on. This book is a nice start. It is not overly heavy; each reading is short. It is not deep into theology nor does it preach. It is a nice easy starting point for us. Also I come from a more full-faith background while he is more consertive; this book has walked a nice middle ground.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Read if you are a new Christian
Review: My fiance and I read this book really hoping to deepen and direct our devotions. The book was written from a simplistic, elementary and sometimes legalistic perspective. We have been Christians for many many years and were hoping for more depth and were disappointed. This might be good for those of you who are new Christians.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Read if you are a new Christian
Review: My fiance and I read this book really hoping to deepen and direct our devotions. The book was written from a simplistic, elementary and sometimes legalistic perspective. We have been Christians for many many years and were hoping for more depth and were disappointed. This might be good for those of you who are new Christians.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Devotions For Dating Couples
Review: My wife-to-be and I could not wait to consume the incredible insight from this devotional book. We especially loved the blend of deep spiritual thought with the "bottom shelf" practical application. This book is a must read for all dating couples, who are serious about finding THE ONE. Two enthusiastic thumbs up!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Devotions For Dating Couples
Review: My wife-to-be and I could not wait to consume the incredible insight from this devotional book. We especially loved the blend of deep spiritual thought with the "bottom shelf" practical application. This book is a must read for all dating couples, who are serious about finding THE ONE. Two enthusiastic thumbs up!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good starter book
Review: Not very deep, but is a good starter book for Christian couples. Covers a broad range of topics and is easy to read. Probably not a good book for long time Christians, as they will not get much out of it.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Good and Useful for it's Audience
Review: This book will be very helpful for many, since much of it focuses more on spirituality and 'discipleship in the grind' (prayer, forgiveness, simplicity) than on theological issues (i.e., the "Calvinism" vs. "Arminianism" debate). There are, to be sure, theological assumptions made by the authors, but they tend to take a backseat, because the aim of the book is to facilitate discussion between you and your dating partner to provide opportunity for understanding and growth. I am a high-church Anglican, and my girlfriend is a Baptist - you can't be much farther apart on the spectrum! But this book provides fairly common ground for a couple to engage each other, despite potential differences.

The book dives head-first into some issues (within the parameters of its scope), while it merely visits the outskirts of others, such as grace, which I think could have been given a more full-orbed treatment. For instance, the original Greek word for Grace, 'charis', meant, among other things, "the desirability of the beautiful". The implications of this are delightfully helpful for our discipleship and our understanding of God, but are neither mentioned nor explored. There are a few other areas where I could raise this same complaint, but I might be asking the authors to chart out more spiritual territory for the reader than they felt needed to be covered.

I would tend to agree strongly with the reviewer below that this book can be somewhat simplistic at times. The simplicity of the book is, conversely, one of it's advantages, because if you haven't had the advantage of picking up technical terms or language specific to the history of the Christian Faith you'll be more comfortable here. In addition to this, short attention spans and busy schedules are accomodated by the length of the devotionals. Just a two to three page reading each day, with five to ten questions at the end of the week fostering discussion about the readings and relating them to your life. The questions aren't aimed at having the couple regurgitate doctrines, but tease out the inner and outer spiritual life of each person in the couple as an organic thing.

Depending on your circumstances, you might want to give this a spin, even if you're not a young Christian. The first and second chapters I didn't get anything out of, so a moderately well-read individual may need to wait a bit to come across a practical, simple insight which they hadn't considered. My girlfriend and I have found the format of this book helpful (particularly the questions for discussion at the end of each week), in particular because she's not used to either maintaining a steady devotional life (especially not the kind of devotional habits we Anglican Christians have, such as common prayer and contemplation) or being engaged with theological themes. I would expect others to find this book useful, as well, but couples who are more widely read, who openly communicate with each other about their theological/spiritual reading, and who have a common devotional life may want to look elsewhere.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Awesome
Review: Well, I don't know about not getting anything out of this book if you've been a "long time" Christian. Aren't we always supposed to be learning, seeking truth?
Anyway, for any couple that feels they are ready to explore their individual spirituality with each other, this is a great way to start.
My favorite part about this devotional was that each of us can do our devotionals on our own (which is great when you're not married/living together and can't necessarily nail down a time to be together every day of the week with work and school to balance) and then at the end of the week, we can discuss it together. This gives you time to really explore how you feel about the week, where you are spiritually, and where you'd like to be.
I have another devotional which I didn't particularly care for because it does not include any guidance questions. In "Devotions for Dating Couples" I love that guidance questions get us started, and then we continue the conversation into what we really enjoyed, learned, and how we can help each other.
When I bought this book, I really didn't know what I was buying... it was so much better than I thought it would be!
* The week is set up so that you can do one devotion each day for five days, and the sixth day has questions to ask and discuss. The devotions are also very short and not as time consuming.
**Buy two books so that you can each write comments, underline, and do the devotionals alone, then you will have your thoughts handy on Saturday (or any day of your choosing) to discuss the week!
God Bless!


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